We have seen above (p. 38) that in the time of Cicero—that is to say, shortly before the Christian era—the works of Aristotle were very little known even to philosophers. The edition of those works by Andronicus was made and published in the last half-century before the birth of Christ. And then—three hundred years after the death of Aristotle—there began silently and imperceptibly the first dawn of that wider reputation of him, which was destined to shine through the whole of Europe for a thousand years with ever-growing and increasing splendour.

During the period of the Roman Empire, the day for original philosophies was gone by. The works of Aristotle, in the form in which they were now presented to the world—being a culmination of ancient thought, and containing a dogmatic exposition of the outlines of every science; being rich in ideas and facts, precise in terms, and yet condensed, and often obscure—offered to the minds of intellectual men, and especially the subtle Greeks of those times, exactly the kind of food and employment which suited them. To study one of these treatises, and comment upon it, ​became now regarded as sufficient achievement for the life of one man. Aristotle thus shared the honours awarded to the sacred books of different nations; he became placed so high as an authority, that merely to expound or explain his meaning was a path to fame. The race of Greek commentators, or "Scholiasts," was spread over three or four centuries, the most distinguished names among them being those of Boethus, Nicolas of Damascus, Alexander of Ægæ, Aspasius, Adrastus, Galenus, Alexander of Aphrodisias, Porphyry, lamblichus, Dexippus, Themistius, Proclus, Ammonius, David the Armenian, Asclepius, Olympiodorus, Simplicius, and Johannes Philoponus. The writings of many of these worthies have been lost, and their memory only survives through their having been quoted in the more enduring commentaries of others. What remains of the whole body of these Scholia is various in worth, ranging from emptiest platitudes up to remarks of subtlety and ability. Occasionally, but too rarely, the Greek scholiasts preserve for us some precious sentence or tradition of antiquity. The late Professor Brandis has condensed into one closely-printed quarto volume all that he considered worth notice of the "Scholia upon Aristotle," and even with some of these we might have dispensed.

Gradually Christianity took possession of the Roman Empire, and then came the inundation of barbarians, whose uncultivated natures had no sympathy with literature, science, or philosophy. Libraries were destroyed, or, unused, underwent the course of natural decay. The arts fell into abeyance, and Western Europe, as if in order to be born again, seemed to pass ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/191 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/192 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/193 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/194 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/195 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/196 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/197 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/198 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/199 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/200 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/201 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/202 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/203 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/204 ​Page:Aristotle (Grant).djvu/205 ​historical point of view—that the works of the Stagirite continue to be studied. As long as the process of higher education in modern Europe consists so largely in imbuing the mind with the literature of classical antiquity, so long will a study of certain works of Aristotle remain as one of the last stages of that process. Those works—especially the 'Rhetoric,' 'Art of Poetry,' 'Ethics,' and 'Politics'— have a remarkable educational value. They form an introduction to philosophy; they invite comparison of ancient and modern ways of thinking; they offer rich stores of information as to human nature—so much the same in all ages; and they train the mind to follow the Aristotelian method of analytic insight. This method consists in concentration of the mind upon the subject in hand, marshalling together all the facts and opinions attainable upon it, and dwelling on these and scrutinising and comparing them till a light flashes on the whole subject. Such is the procedure to be learnt, by imitation, from Aristotle.